Soaps and other similar articles are often of a moulded shape, for example a substantially oval or pillow-like shape. For each individual article, particularly if it is moulded, it is often preferred to use a parallelpiped packaging which is provided by a kind of box, or by an actual box made of card (suitably relatively thin and flexible) and then in a wrapping of sheet material. Consequently there are packaging machines which simultaneously wrap about the article to be packaged, a piece of card, suitably die cut and scored, and a piece of sheet material and thus form the box and the related wrapping; the scoring of the blank along the lines where it is desired that the blank should fold facilitates folding at the appropriate places. Conventional, high-output, packaging machines are designed such that the article cooperates with both these wrapping elements to provide a frame of reference and a support for these elements so that the material may be wrapped around them. However, the article to be packaged can perform its operative function and its reference function in relation to the paper and card efficiently only if it is sufficiently hard and square. An oval article of the consistency of soap, processed by a conventional packaging machine, could easily be damaged if one of its narrower zones were forced against a piece of card in order to enable the latter to be folded at its score-lines for the first time, that is, if it had not previously been creased by folding about these lines. Moreover an article of oval shape would not provide, per se, a sufficient frame of reference and support for a piece of card to be wrapped about it and it would not therefore be possible to form a box satisfactorily.
Consequently, in the case of oval or, in particular, moulded soaps, specialised packaging machines have been available for some time in which the function normally carried out by the soap is performed by mechanical components which surround the soap and are retracted from the latter when the packaging is at an advanced stage of completion. The soaps are then satisfactorily processed by the specialised packaging machines, although this is relatively complex and slow and consequently productivity is low.
In order to form this type of parallelpiped box, use has recently been made of an elongate piece of card provided transversely with four score-lines. These transverse score-lines define four zones in the card intended to form the four walls of the side surface of the parallelepiped and, at one end, an end zone arranged to overlap the other end zone of the card so as to close this side surface. It is preferable for the zone at said one end to be elongated thereby forming a tongue which the consumer may use to open the package and remove the article contained therein. Apart from the end zones of the card there are therefore two adjacent zones (one adjacent each end zone) separated by a central zone. At each side the card is also provided with a pair of flaps intended to be disposed as the ends of the box. These are defined by longitudinal score-lines in the card and project from two zones adjacent to the central zone which therefore provide a pair of recesses in the card.